When is the boiler water too dirty?

Daniel_3

I’ve not had to do much water makeup over the season. Maybe I’ll pull the ball valve about 1 every 2-3 months for a better fill when it hits the LWC. I’ve done SteamMaster tablets once about 2 years ago when I noticed there was too much bounce in the glass plus some visible surface sludge. This view is from the end of cycle. One pipe steam here with a 10 year old Burnham. Before the start of a new cycle the water does have a little suspension of rust etc so the water is never crystal clear until the summer when it’s out of service.

My system is balanced, quiet, and the cycles are consistently fairly quick for my house of over 500 sqft of edr.

Do the tablets need to be used often? Would you got it again with 2-3 tablets?

Fred

@Daniel_3 from the looks of that water, I would say you need to drain the boiler (cooled) flush it out and refill it. It also looks like there are water droplets on the top half of the sight glass. If so, the boiler needs to be skimmed. I also have a Burnham and they are especially sensitive to oil on the surface of the water. I add Steamaster tablets (no more than two in mine but it has a 25 gal. water capacity) You may only need to add one. They recommend you add them when the light purple color changes or is gone from being too diluted. I only add them at the start of the heating season and maybe midway through the heating season but I blow my boiler down every week or two (MM#67 LWCO). If you have a probe type LWCO, you probably don't need the tablets at mid- season.

SlamDunk

Is that the right place for lowest water permissible tag?

clammy

That’s about normal it s the lowest permissible water level .i feel that every steam boiler needs a good washing out every few years some brands more then others and some system more then others due to age and such . The worse part is usually the original installers never thought about draining and leaving ease of access to the return boiler tappings by installing a full size tee instead of a elbow and full size nipples w caps on unused return tapping doesn’t cost much more .The build up of sediment and mud in the bottom of boilers can effect the production and quality of steam a boiler can produce and raises stack temps and wastes energy .If it’s set up to easily wash out its beautiful .peace and good luck clammy

Fred

SlamDunk said:

Is that the right place for lowest water permissible tag?

Those tags seem to be all over the place. Mine is at the Normal water line but most I've seem are down low, like yours.

SlamDunk

I think mine is a bit higher than the LWCO probe.